Google's Chrome OS is coming to a netbook near you sometime later this year. The Web-centric, Linux-based, open source platform will offer a lightweight, cost-effective alternative operating system for portable computing. Eventually, Google plans to expand the scope ofChrome OS to take on Windows on the desktop as well--a goal that requires both a solid operating system and a significant culture shift.

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Chrome is essentially aWeb browser as an operating system. A media player app will be included that will facilitate offline music play and photo viewing, but aside from that the platform is designed to operate exclusively in the cloud and take advantage of the vast portfolio of services from Google.

The operating system seems ideal for the netbook crowd, or possibly even as a platform for tablet devices to compete with Apple's iPad. Netbooks and tablets generally lack CD or DVD drives and the smaller hard drive sizes of the diminutive portable laptops seem geared for storing only the core OS components. An open source operating system that can reduce costs and make the hardware into more of instant-on, cloud-based device might be welcome among the netbook crowd.

The Chrome OS might also provide a solid alternative for a tablet OS. Apple has built the iPad on the iPhone mobile OS, HP is building the Hurricane on Palm's WebOS mobile OS, and the Dell Streak is built on Google's Android mobile OS. There is demand, though, for a tablet that is more like a desktop and less like a smartphone. It remains to be seen if Windows 7 can be nimble enough to satisfy in the tablet market, but the Chrome OS seems to comfortably straddle between mobile OS and desktop OS--a potentially ideal position for a tablet OS.

But, what of Google's aspirations to usurp the crown of desktop dominance from Microsoft? Assuming that the Chrome OS lives up to expectations and provides a polished, capable experience, there is still a long way to go before a Web-centric OS can even begin to replace the traditional desktop operating system (a.k.a. Windows).

Look, the Mac operating system has been available since 1984 and has only five percent of the OS market. Linux has been around since 1991--or 1994 if you want to start counting from the 1.0 release, yet Linux in all of its varieties has barely more than one percent of the operating system market. Can we really expect Chrome to knock Microsoft off its pedestal any time soon when two very capable operating systems have been barely able to scratch the surface after 20 years?

At its heart, Chrome is just another version of Linux. However, the Google brand carries a lot of consumer clout. It is respected. It is trusted. Businesses and consumers alike are much more likely to adopt a Linux variant with the Google stamp of approval, so it has that going for it. But, Apple is also respected, and trusted, and has a strong and loyal following...and five percent of the market.

Many small and medium businesses are already invested in Google. They rely on Gmail for messaging, Google Docs for office productivity, Google Voice for communicating, and Google Wave and/or Google Buzz for collaborating and social networking. Chrome will work nicely for them.

Many organizations, though, are reluctant to put that much faith in the cloud. There are availability and security concerns. Many companies will need to address the compliance issues associated with trusting personal information, and sensitive or confidential data to third-party providers such as Google. There are some hurdles to overcome before the desktop culture can be abandoned completely.

What Chrome needs in order to compete with, or replace Windows as the desktop standard is a complete culture shift. Chrome most likely won't be any more successful than Mac or Linux in fighting Windows on its own turf, but as the culture continues to evolve to a more mobile, more cloud-based model, it plays to Chrome's strengths and arguably puts Windows on the defensive to scramble and adapt.

Google will now let users add personal photos to the background of the traditionally minimalist search page, Google announced in a blog post Thursday.

In what is perhaps a transparent effort to out-feature Microsoft Bing, Google is ditching its boring white background and letting users upload their own photos. TheMicrosoft Bing search site features a different, Microsoft-chosen background picture every day.

Users are given three methods for customization--they can upload a photo from their computer, they can choose a photo from their Google-run Picasa photo album, or they can choose a photo from the public Picasa photo album. The feature is not yet available to all users, but Google said it plans to roll out the feature for U.S. users over the next few days.

To change your Google background photo: click on the link in the lower left corner of the Google search page (if you do not see this link, the feature has not been added to your Google yet).

Will a big hulking image on the search page background affect Google's load time, though? No, Google assured InformationWeek in an email, the load time will not be affected.

According to a Google spokesperson, "The homepage does not load any slower. With or without a background image, the Google search elements show as quickly as before, allowing users to search just as quickly as without the new feature. We make this possible by post-loading the photo -- we load the search elements first and then load the picture into your browser cache and show it as soon as it is available. Meanwhile you can already perform your search."

So it looks like Google is dedicated to user personalization--either that, or they looked at Bing and decided that perhaps minimalism isn't all it's cracked up to be. If you really enjoy Google's traditional search page, don't worry--you can still use it.

Google's Marissa Mayer, vice president of search products and user experience, suggests that users start tweeting snapshots of their new Google search pages, using the Twitter hashtag #myGooglepage. I won't get started on how even Google thinks you should tweet instead of "buzzing."

There has been plenty of headway in the realm of in-car technological innovation in recent years. From the days of being able to give out your car-phone number, to modern cars with built in HUDs for navigation.